By: Charley Warady
The term Forex expert advisors sounds like it should involve an office, a couch, and a guy in a chair with a steno pad ready to hear all of your Forex problems. Well, it's not. As a matter of fact, it doesn't involve humans at all; at least not directly.
Put simply, the Forex expert advisors are the automated system of Forex trading. Whether it's a standard robot system, or if you're more apt to lean towards programming yourself there are tools out there and you can build your own. In either case, once installed you just leave it running and the money comes pouring in. Or not.
Advantages
The obvious advantage to implementing Forex expert advisors is that you don't have to do anything. They will trade for you. You install them into your broker's platform and it runs without you having to do anything. The initial setup is about the entirety of your involvement in the process.
One of the reasons Forex traders will choose to use Forex expert advisors is because they don't want to trade the account themselves. Other reasons vary from wanting to do it only part time, to wanting to make money with no effort. All valid reasons. Most will promise around ten percent return annually on your investment. It that's what appeals to you, then it might be the way to go. They will also promise to limit your loss, but that depends on how much you have in there to begin with. In either case, the fine print will always cover the Forex expert advisors.
Just like you've been told throughout your whole life; if it looks too good to be true, it most definitely is. This is not the 'get rich quick' scheme that is going to work where all others failed. You should do the same, if not more, research work you did when you choose your Forex expert advisors.
Disadvantages
If you are looking for a career as a professional Forex trader, the use of Forex expert advisors will not be a benefit. There is no substitute for research and hard work, and there are no sure things. The lack of control is an obvious disadvantage, no matter how much you can tweak the initial setup or change things once it's running. If you lose money, you can't blame the system. It's what you bought into.
Another thing to keep in mind is that these companies don't promise vast fortunes. In most cases, individual experienced Forex traders make much more money than any Forex expert advisors system. Generally speaking, the Forex trader using a robot is using it to supplement an income; not establish one. After all, if it was that easy...everybody would be doing it.
It's a tribute to the technology that the market lends itself to this kind of trading method. It's not a bad thing by any stretch of the imagination. But if you are going to do it, you need to take special care as to your choice because the cost of the product might be the least of your problems.